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Existing in ruptures, I suppose that is the consequences of living life. In 1993, my family went aboard an airplane that would bring us to the United States. It was not an easy flight, and as I know now, nothing about this life is ever easy. The dizzying pain of the shuttering noise overwhelmed me, leaving pungent ailments, vomit all over my own shirt. I was from a refugee camp, which my tender memories leave only with it, a vision of sipping chocolate aid milk.

In this queer refugee life, I am always imagining the sweet escape, thinking of its landscapes as close enough, to enjoy its everlasting moments. And I linger in these fantasies that wretched my birth and travels to America. Imagining back on my queer life, the blockades of anguish, mixed with sweetness always had a fervent flavor. At the earliest onset, my feelings of queerness, of loving and desiring, were nothing but strange, familiar, and true. And yet, I myself could not fathom its sweetness, which I mustered as anguish. I must perpetually compete with these recurring cleavages in this realm of life. These continual exigencies are what makes life meaningful, interesting at the least, I suppose.

“I realize now,
Those moments of eery chaos,
Will always thwart my memories,
I realize now,
That illusionary specter of joy,
Were my only hopes of life,
I realize now,
Those discolored ambiences of life,
Were the containment of all which is never to be had,
I realize now,
Those remnants of glimmer,
Was and can never be consumed, and,
I realize now,
The unsettled visions that outline the shallow spirals,
Can liberate me from my desperation,
I realize now,
The protruding anger of my soul,
Was always the symbol of my emancipated queer life,
I realize now,
That moment of desolate altercation,
Is it not the emblem of my refugee life,
I realize now,
Never to let go of the blemishes of my imagination,
It is to be happily queer in a world of deformed chaos.”

That moment is funny to me now. It is as clear as that window that shows the first signs of storm clouds. And yet, that moment exists only as a remnant of memory, driving down that dark, suicidal road. That moment of desperation, I realized, that despair is not death, but the languishing hunger to master life’s most miserable grandeurs. I suppose now that the drive, the run, the escape, the realization, the return, all were leading to this moment in my gay, my queer, my Hmong, my refugee, my bizarre, my funny, my beautiful life.

Ruptures in the human heart, physically and emotionally, are inevitable consequences of living. This discursivity in my happiness will settle itself. Living an unsettled life, of queerness, and embracing all of its exigencies, its messiness, of loving that man, of hating myself, of loving myself, I like the view from this focal point. For now, I will allow the intermittent episodes of my life to encapsulate itself into an everlasting nothingness, to be sorted out in other spaces and times unknowable.

Kong Pheng Pha is a writer from Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Celebrate June PRIDE Month by contributing your narrative to be part of AAPI LGBTQ PRIDE Narrative Series. If you identify as AAPI LGBTQ and want to contribute your narrative or have questions, please email Linda for more information – linda@mwsmovement.com

We Will Not Be Silent – #Asians4BlackLives MWSM marching in MN Rise Up & #ShutItDown with Baltimore

In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Month this May 2015, we present the sequel of our narrative series called Critical Reflections of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the Midwest. Since our Raising UP the Hmong LGBTQQI Narratives launched in 2013, we’ve gotten over 16,000 views and 7,832 visitors from over 100 countries. We’ve also received many emails from readers who appreciate Hmong LGBTQQI people sharing their narratives about real life experiences, thoughts, family conversations and situations relating to Hmong and American cultures, and examples of important life changes and decisions made.

In this Critical Reflections of AAPI narrative series, we have collected a wide range of stories from diverse experiences to continue supporting and fostering the growth of AAPI Narratives in America, while at the same time, serve a purpose to counter the stereotypes, generalizations, and mis-education of AAPI communities told by mainstream.

We will be launching the first narrative later on this afternoon so be sure to subscribe to our blog, tweet us @mwsmovement, reblog us on Tumblr or LIKE us on Facebook to get updates on when each narratives are posted throughout May 2015!

Celebrate May Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month by contributing your narrative to be part of AAPI Midwest Narrative Series. We are still accepting submissions so if you identify as AAPI, currently or have lived in the Midwest and want to contribute a narrative, please email all questions to Linda – linda@mwsmovement.com

I am the eldest daughter and grew up in a large family. I always felt overwhelmed with all the duties that were given to me. The housework, the child care tasks, the cooking responsibilities and so forth. All the nitty gritty dirty work was my responsibility. I was always expected to accomplish these tasks whether I liked it or not and I am still expected to tend to these responsibilities today. My parents are extremely traditional. I come from a patriarchal society. I’m not going to sit here and support the idea that men are at the top of the spectrum, but the disparity is definitely present. It’s disappointing that this inequality exist and nobody’s doing anything about it, or at least nobody’s talking about it. I know we see it. I know we feel it. I know we have all experienced it. Perhaps, we feel it’s taboo. Perhaps, we are scared of the consequences. Or maybe we just feel like nobody’s going to listen. The moment I speak out about how unfair these standards are, I am considered disobedient and disrespectful. It has always been a cycle of oppression. In my culture, men are born with privileges and power. Women have to work their entire lives in order to gain even the slightest amount of power and respect.

I consider myself blessed and privileged to be able to attend college, an opportunity that many people do not have. I am a first generation college student, so neither one of my parents nor grandparents have had a proper education. Being a first generation college student is very difficult. I am the first daughter in my family to go to college. My parents emigrated to the United States to escape the refugee camps of Thailand. They escaped a war torn country in hopes of acquiring the necessary tools to survive in a land that was unfamiliar to them, America. When I talk to my parents, I see that they value education very much; I see the desire in their struggles to push my siblings and I to do well in school. Like most other Hmong families, my family values education, however, there are stigmas, especially for Hmong women and girls in higher education. The academic achievements of the women and girls are often overlooked in my family. My brothers are encouraged and highly praised for going to college, but my efforts go without notice. Some of my family members even doubt I will ever finish college. But, here I am today with a college degree and a job that pays me well.

You have to work hard in order to get where you want to be. Life does not come with instructions. You start from scratch and unearth your own recipe. You throw in your own spices and create it to your liking. If something does not fit in, get rid of it. If something appeals to you, add it in. You just have to keep adding and adjusting until you get the ideal recipe.

One thing that I have always struggled with was my sexual orientation. Shifting gender disparities aside, my sexual orientation is probably the biggest struggle I’ve dealt with. A few years ago, I posted a public blog post revealing my sexual orientation and shortly after, I received a very nasty message from an anonymous person. The nature of the message was essentially telling me that those who are attracted to the same sex are disgusting and should be shunned by society.

Growing up, I never felt that I was different. I knew I was always attracted to boys, but I also found girls to be attractive. I never saw this as being different from others. It was just a natural feeling to me; so, I thought everyone felt the same way, but the older I got, the more difficult things had become. High school was an overwhelming experience and made me realize that if you didn’t find a clique to hang out with then you were the odd sheep out. I was indeed the odd sheep out. I was rebellious. I was a tomboy and only wore jeans, band t-shirts, and skater shoes. There, I had cut my hair for the first time. My hair went from short, to mullet, to spikes. I was defiant, but I was still a good student. I was in the top 20 of my graduating class and was only one of the few Hmong students who took AP classes. I mostly kept to myself, but I knew some people because we had classes together. I had my first relationship my senior year of high school and it was a first for a lot of things.

I dated my first girlfriend a few months before my high school graduation. We were young and so in love. In the beginning, we kept our relationship a secret. She was opened about her sexual orientation, but I tried to hide mine as much as I could. Not because I was ashamed, but because I was afraid of the backlash from my Hmong community. The more secretive I became, the more my friends started questioning me. I eventually gave in and came out to my closest friends first. I knew I couldn’t keep my relationship a secret forever. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do, but I had to overcome it. Some of them said they saw it coming; others were taken aback by my confession, but still accepted me. The next step was to come out to my family. I didn’t want to do it all in one big step, so I came out to my siblings. Surprisingly, they were very supportive of me. They did not judge me and they did not question me at all. They supported my relationship with my girlfriend the whole time we were together.

Now, all who were left to tell was my parents. There were many instances in which I thought I was ready to come out to my parents. However, every time I approached them, my whole body would go numb. I would be at a loss of words and I would tell myself that I didn’t have to force myself to tell them if I wasn’t ready yet. I never did gather up enough courage to tell my parents. To this day, my parents still do not know. I don’t know if I will ever tell them.

I used to be bothered about my sexual orientation. There was a point in my life when I was upset at myself because I couldn’t turn away my own feelings. Somehow, I felt like I had disappointed my parents being the oldest daughter with their high expectations for me. So when I started discovering my sexual preferences, I knew I was treading on dangerous waters. I always thought hiding my sexual orientation would eventually make all the feelings disappear, but I’ve learned to accept it as a part of who I am. I’m not ashamed to tell people that I am attracted to people of all sexual identities. Society brainwashes our perceptions and views on everything. The moment we sense unfamiliar presence in the air, we become judgmental. Our minds have been trained so well that we automatically single out anybody who dares to be a little different, but I say, “Dare to be different. Explore. Live a little.”

Pax is a writing fanatic who draws her inspiration from the people in her every day life. She hails from the Twin Cities. On her spare time, she likes to people watch, dance to Pitbull music and sing along to sappy Hmong songs. She is obsessed with dream catchers, green tea lattes, and absolutely believe her spirit animal is a wolf. She wears mix matched socks, but hates sleeping with her socks on. She hoards stationery cards and has boxes of them under her bed collecting dust. She is a woman of few words, but her thoughts can silence an entire city. You can follow Pax on tumblr.

Celebrate May Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month by contributing your narrative to be part of AAPI Midwest Narrative Series. If you identify as AAPI in the Midwest and want to contribute your narrative or have questions, please email Linda for more information – linda@mwsmovement.com

Excerpts and links as stated by Midwest Solidarity Movement members may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Linda Her and Midwest Solidarity Movement with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

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